News and Rumors

Hello BBOS members and guests, it's time for our Weekly Recap for 10/9 - 10/15, 2011. The links below are the "in a nutshell" of what happened in everything BlackBerry last week. Leave us a comment on what you thought was the most memorable moment of the BlackBerry weekly recap!

It's been about 6 weeks now since Mike Kirkup, former Sr. Director of Developer Relations, announced his resignation from RIM. As we all know, leaving a job where you have grown to know and love those around you can leave one thinking back on the many memories. It also brings up fresh perspectives, with the opportunity to look in from the outside, to be able to transcend the one dimensional zone of "in the moment," and reflect back on what type of impact one has left. In Mike's new blog titled, Mobile Insights, he shares the lessons he has learned from leaving RIM, and how the transition has given him new insights into how to carry out the next steps in his career. We all miss Mike and wish him the best of luck into his future endeavors. It will be odd to have no Mike Kirkup at DevCon Americas 2011 coming up in just a few days.

Looks like its a good day for Beta Zone members. Earlier today the Beta Zone released version 2.0.0.42 for Ticketmaster. Now they have released version 3.0.1.20 update for BlackBerry App World. Seems as though there are quite a few important issues that have been addressed along with a few performance and speed enhancements. The Beta Zone is very important for the development of solid robust apps for BlackBerry devices. It allows for applications to be tested by us as consumers before they go mainstream. This way we can let the developers know of any bugs or issues that come up when using the app. If you do not have a Beta Zone account head on over to the Beta Zone website and get one.

A list of the important fixed issues are as follows:

Performance and speed enhancements across all BlackBerry devices

Multiple translation/localization errors

Multiple instances of UI lag

Apps not appearing in “My World” for some users

User continuously notified to update the same applications when on the latest version

Memory leak occurring and taking up too much device memory

Null pointer exception during downloads

Escaping out of viewing app description returns user to top of installed/uninstalled list – App World should not go back to the top of list but return to the previously viewed app in the list

Error when opening and closing some apps with the error message: "Uncaught Exception;Attempt to delete a field that doesn't belong to the manager”

Unable to upgrade "Try and Buy" app after installing App World 3.0

“OutOfMemoryError” when attempting to launch App World

No "reinstall" button available for Facebook / BB Bridge / etc in App World after deletion

The “Reboot” option is available in the menu of AppWorld 2.1.x.x and it does not show in AppWorld 3.0.0.x

Beta Zone members, Ticketmaster for BlackBerry has been updated to v2.0.0.42 . If you do not have a Beta Zone account, head on over to the Beta Zone website and start creating your profile. Its free and easy to setup, keep in mind though that the program is not available in all countries. So if you can not get in the Beta Zone don't worry, we will keep you up to date on all the latest Beta releases right here on BBOS. Happy downloading!

There is just something about white phones that seem to attract people. I know it does for me, I think its just the thought of seeing another color besides the traditional black colors. It seems as though Bell Mobility will be getting a white Curve 9360 later on this month. Yes, we know its not the white Bold 9900 that seems to be floating around, but this will do for now. What do you think, does color matter when choosing a phone? Lets us know in the poll.

A few weeks ago we were excited to report that the Citrix Receiver for the BlackBerry PlayBook was available. Since then there have been a few updates most notably the 0.9.1 update that added support for SSL/TLS connections. This one not so exciting, but it does fix issues that caused the application to hang or fail to launch.

Here is whats new in version 0.9.2:

-Fixes for issues that caused the application to hang or fail to launch.

Things are slowly starting to improve around the world as users are starting to see seed improvements while messaging. The following is the latest statement from RIM regarding this disaster:

Wednesday 12th October – 23:30 (GMT-5)
In Europe, Middle East, India and Africa, we are seeing a significant increase in service levels. Service levels are also progressing well in the U.S., Canada and Latin America and we are seeing increased traffic throughput on most services, although there are still some delays and services levels may still vary amongst customers. Our global teams are continuing to work as quickly as possible to restore full and consistent service across all regions.

Please continue to let us know if you are still experiencing problems.

SK Telecom has officially released OS 6.0.0.666 for the BlackBerry Pearl 3G 9100. This is the latest OS for the 9100, so get those phones out and start updating. Let us know how the update works for you.

If your like me, then you may have been patiently waiting for more games like Dead Space to arrive on the PlayBook, that really take advantage of the computing power that the PlayBook has to offer. Today was a good day for BlackBerry gamers, as Gameloft released a total of five new games for the BlackBerry PlayBook. Earlier in the week Electronic Arts also released a few of their games to the PlayBook.

Today, RIM announced BlackBerry Analytics Service 1.0 powered by Webtrends, a free service that enables developers to collect and analyze data on how their apps are used. With the insight from this service, any developer of Java-based apps for BlackBerry smartphones can:

Understand how users are engaging with an app

Enhance user experience to drive more downloads

Learn how to market apps more effectively

Better deal with bugs as they arise

The BlackBerry Analytics Service is simple and easy to use as developers can integrate tracking into their applications with just a few lines of code. More than 20 interactive reports can be generated which include:

Overview metrics showing active users, new users, frequency of use, engagement in duration and depth of use, number of screens viewed, and conversions

About a week ago we wrote an article about the Russian company ElcomSoft, and their ability to exploit BlackBerry encryption. This was big news as there were no known ways to crack or hack a BlackBerry device in the manner described by ElcomSoft. We also stated that there was no reason to sound the alarms, and declare BlackBerry an insecure device. We all know that BlackBerry remains one of the most secure devices on the planet. However, I know its important for various reasons, that users be made aware of tactics that an attacker can use to gain entry to their personal information.